The Gallifrey Horror
by natural-blues
Summary: "My name is Alec. I've been having nightmares ever since I was a little boy. All of them seem to feature the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. We have the same mark on our wrists, and when she touches me... I can't explain it. She's everything, and it's destroying my life..."
1. The Yacht from Hell

This is a gift for Gingergallifreyan for Secret Santa! I am so sorry it is being posted so late, I was so terribly sick, and my fever just kept coming and going so I couldn't finish. I felt awful! I hope this makes up for it.

The requirements were: Any kind of AU, as long as the Doctor and Rose were happy together. Fobbed! okay, and bonus for use of the name "Theta".

Hopefully, this fic will live up to that. It's a bit darker than my usual, but I was inspired to give you something a bit outside the element, and I really, really hope you like it.

There will be some violence, it's Lovecraftian. There will be pining, smut, soulmarks, and ofc, an ending where the Doctor and Rose are extremely happy together. If you're a huge fan of River Song or Reinette, please know that they're featured here, but our protagonist finds them to be obnoxious as sin.

* * *

"Commodore Lethbridge-Stewart! There's a wreck, off the starboard side!"

The sound of the lower ranked Royal Navy sailors clamouring to get a view, be nearer to assist, sent a tremor along the hull. The Commodore made it over, taking a pair of binoculars from a midshipman and looking out.

Calling it a wreck was being extremely kind. The boat had been pounded nigh on to sawdust in some parts, and the fins cresting above the water led him to believe that whatever corpse had caused the darkened pool mixed in with the water had been taken care of already - or was going to be polished off soon enough, at any rate. All in all, it looked like a tragedy, but naught much to be done outside of identifying the vessel. As his ship came closer, the sharks took their quick exit, knowing when they'd been outmatched. Shortfin Makos were the cheetahs of the sea.

"Check over the wreckage," he ordered. "Find out the name, and we'll report this. Poor souls on board."

The Commodore watched, biting his lip as he heard his wife call out after their daughter, Kate.

"Katherine Marie, don't run on the ship! You'll fall, and take your baby sister with you!"

"Kate, come on over here, take a look at your first shipwreck," he called out, cheerfully, ignoring his wife's gasp at the impropriety of a little girl seeing that.

"Wow, dad! It's destroyed!" his twelve year old said, eyes wide. "Is there anything left?"

"Not much from the looks of it, but that's why there's a crew in that boat right there. They'll go over and take a look."

"Was anyone on the boat?"

"Might have been, we're not sure, my love. You see the darkened spots? That might be blood-" he ignored his wife's second gasp - "but it could just as easily be petrol, or some food or another supply that the boat was carrying. It could just as easily be some chum, or some unfortunate fish that fell into the sea and made the local sharks quite pleased."

She giggled, and Doris squeezed his hand, shooting him a tight-lipped warning look. He gave her a reassuring smile, pushing down the nerves in his stomach. Something about the waters they were in felt a bit… off. He was too old to believe in fairy tales, but it felt like someone had just walked over his grave. Looking down (and then kicking himself for such a thing) he could see that the waters were choppy, a darker shade of blue than he would have expected for being so close to the shore.

He couldn't see the bottom of the English Channel on a good day, but the waters were usually a bit clearer than this. It had been such a gorgeous, sunny day until they'd begun to hit these waters, in fact. Rainstorms weren't uncommon in England, for God's sake. He was looking for problems where there weren't any, and hadn't done so since he was in Bible Study.

There were no demons here.

"Commodore! We found something!"

"Dear God!" Another shipmate screamed. "Someone help me!"

Chaos descended on the scene, as multiple men were shouting at the same time, followed by the sound of breaking boards and someone falling into the water.

* * *

_Alec felt himself floating, drifting in and out of familiar water, his body gently lilting from side to side with the motion of the ocean. He could hear soft bubbling from somewhere, a clam buzzing along the floor to escape a predator, and it was a comforting noise. Stretching his fingers out and upward, he could feel blood returning to his appendages. The gentle tugs of the waves above tousled his hair, and his lips twitched before blooming into a soft smile._

_Opening his eyes to the familiar kelp forest, the sunlight filtering through the water, dancing along the waves and making it more beautiful than any sunset he'd ever seen. Home, that was the feeling that this seascape gave him. He was home, and as he kicked off from the sea floor a bit, poking about the greenery, he truly felt it in his bones. He was like his father in that way, he supposed, always needing to be near the water. _

_He could hear soft noises, like a dull roar but from far off now. The muted noises underneath the waves, the vibration still felt, as though metal clanked with a bathtub while one's head was submerged. He could feel her body singing to him, she was calling to him from somewhere in the deep._

_His angel._

_Listening for the singing noises flattened by how far they had to travel - likely seals, mimicking the boats around them. When he was a little boy, his father had honked the horn of the ship once, in a varied pattern, and he could hear the seals ashore striving to copy it. He ignored the feel of the moss on his bare feet, knowing this place for its safety for so long that he didn't panic, thinking something was going to eat him like he'd thought as a little boy._

_A school of fish swam and fluttered by, dancing along and hiding amongst the greenery as a piece of wood, jagged and soaked through, casually fell from the surface. It was joined by another, and another - what had happened up there?! Was there an explosion? Part of a wooden plank boat was sinking from the surface flipping too quickly for him to read the words on it and it sent his gaze above. He witnessed sharks jutting along the wreckage, the soft blooms of ruby darkening instantly against the waves before he was jerked away from the image._

_He felt a hand grab his, and pulling him out of the kelp by the most beautiful angel he had ever seen. When he turned to look back, the image was gone, and no matter how much he tried to remember it in any detail, he couldn't. It was like overexposed film, burnt away. Her hands were on his face, turning him back to what was most important to him - her._

_His angel._

_He didn't know her name. They had never spoken, which made sense as they were underwater… but he could feel her feelings. He could almost sense her in his mind, and as she floated with him, her smile never ceased. He kicked his legs, never able to breathe down here like she could until she gifted it to him._

_The desperation always built up, and the one time he had tried to swim to the surface to breathe, he had never made it. He kicked his bare feet, in his pajama pants, while she was in an ethereal, long white night dress. It flowed about her with the waves so elegantly, her golden hair catching the light from the waves as she touched his hands. _

_A soft lean in, and with a kiss from his angel he could breathe, reluctant to pull away but desperate for the lungfuls of air he took under the water. Her brown eyes looked almost obsidian under the waves, and as he swam by her side, he felt like he was home. Her hand touched his, and he could see the strange mark on her inner wrist, the same place his was. They perfectly matched, and as his fingers brushed her mark, it glowed. She gave him a teasing smile and did the same to his, and he felt pleasure alight him. _

_They were swimming toward a cave, and he felt fear on sight of it in every dream. It didn't look like any cave he should be going anywhere near. The stonework decorations all looked menacing, the writing along it was in that same script as was on his wrist. The nearer he got, the nearer the dull roar came. It sounded like a mixture of singing and chanting, and he could feel the tightening of fear in his chest. The carvings in stone looked like creatures out of horror films, deep sea creatures that murdered blondes in bikinis, and ate sharks for lunch._

_He tried, like always, to take her hand and pull her away from the cave. She stopped, like she always did, giving him that soft tilt of her head, confusion in her beautiful eyes. She pulled his arm, swimming ever closer. She wanted to go inside, for reasons he couldn't fathom, and didn't he trust her with his mind, body, heart and soul? He glanced back toward the entrance. The mouth of the cave was huge, a monolith in the deep, and seemed to be ribbed on the inside, as though what made it had been monstrous._

_He could hear the singing and chanting come louder, the closer they came._

_**Iyah… Iyah… Iyah, iyah, Rassilon fhtagn…**_

_He had to distract her, stop her from pulling them in. She was such a strong swimmer, he could never fight her. He pulled her to him and kissed her, deeply, the water's salty inclusion on his tasting her tongue not an unwelcome one. She was instantly a willing participant, her hands gliding along his body as he leaned her against the outside of the cave for leverage, ignoring the claws of the monster she was up against. Her supple breasts met his palms and he worked them, kneading them as he pulled back, seeing their alabaster shade under the deep. She was so perfect, and he would finally have her._

_The chanting grew louder, matching his pulse in his ears, encouraging him. Have her, the chanting seemed to call. Mate her, make her yours. Take your place, take your prize._

_He ground against her, drunk off the feel of her hands on him, the pressure they used along his sides and the nails scraping along his back. He let out a growl that should have scared him, biting her neck. Just as he reached to feel the silk between her legs, a hissing noise drew his attention to the side, seeing a giant monster with fangs opening its jaws to-_

* * *

Alec's eyes snapped open on a gasp as he heard a woman's voice hissing 'ouch!' and he looked up, seeing Jeanne looking at her hand and pouting. Alec already wasn't in the best mood due to his dream being interrupted, but seeing Jeanne made him ready to tear the room apart in rage.

"What the _fuck_ are you doing in my cabin?!" he snapped.

"Oh, Alec, baby! I was just thinking…. It's time to take our relationship to the next level."

His lip curled as he took in the fact that she was in a negligee. Her hair styled, makeup tastefully done, perfume carefully applied… she looked like she could have stepped out of a Victoria's Secret catalogue. Any red blooded man would have been ready to take her to bed.

Any red blooded man but _him_.

"We don't _have_ a bloody relationship, and if we did, I wouldn't stand for you waking me up in the middle of the night to bother me!"

That had been partially a lie. A few times Tess had woken him up in the middle of the night, and while still sleep drunk, he had been able to work off his need while still daydreaming about his angel. But the instant she had begun to make noise, moan, or speak, he'd gone limp and ended up sleeping on the couch, grumpily.

If his angel was real, she could wake him up any time, for any reason. He would wait on her hand and foot if she needed, just for one kiss. One look. One touch.

"Mon dieu, Alec, do you realise how fortunate you are? I want you. Me! I could have any man, and I want you. I choose you. Why do you insist on playing hard to get? Do you need to remind me of how virile you are? I see your manliness."

He felt a twitch forming right above his right eye as his jaw clenched. He'd sworn an oath, and would absolutely not murder her. Absolutely not, the daft hen.

"But the way you play hard to get, mon cher, it makes me think you're not interested in having sex with me at all! I insist you stop playing these games with me. I want you, lover. Let us- "

"Right now, my interest was a good night's sleep. That's been interrupted now-"

"Is it another woman?"

_Yes. One who doesn't exist, but drives me spare._

She took his silence for an affirmative. "Oh god! Tell me it isn't River Song! That ancient trollop! Obsessed with tombs and pyramids. She's likely to be mummified down below."

"FOR FUCK'S SAKE!"

She climbed onto the bed, and he shoved her off, angrily, feeling satisfaction in the thud noise followed by a gasp. Good. Maybe the wind knocked out of her would teach her something.

"I have told you to leave, and I'm still a goddamned cop as long as we're in British waters, so sod tae fuck off. Now, I'm going to be taking a shower, and interested in coming back to an empty room so that I can do my research until I fall back to sleep."

Jeanne pouted, stomping her foot and making a childish whine. He marched into the bathroom and slammed the door, snicking the lock. Pulling himself out of his silk pajama bottoms, he lifted the toilet seat and set about doing his business. Mid-piss, he snapped, "I don't hear the sounds of LEAVING!" and got the satisfaction of hearing Jeanne stomping out of his cabin and slamming the door behind her.

He shook off, pulling his trousers back up, and triple checked his room before locking the door and applying the chain.

He rolled his eyes, sending a puff of breath upwards to get his hair out of his fucking eyes. He was furious, and the last thing he needed was to be on this ship with three of the most obnoxious women he had ever had the displeasure of meeting, and his scheming sister and her best friend, that owned the yacht in question.

"You gotta put yourself out there, Alec," he mimicked in a higher pitch tone, rolling his eyes at Clara's statement. She was his sister, he loved her, and he wanted to just get this whole bloody weekend over as quick as possible so she would stop bugging him about finding a new wife.

He was over Tess. He'd be angry that he'd been cheated on, but angrier that her duplicity had lead to the crime of child murder going unpunished. He'd been angrier that he had lost custody of his daughter. His marriage had been a lie from the start, but his daughter… the only good thing to come of it.

He got into the shower, closing his eyes and letting the hot water beat down on him. Her face flashed behind his eyes, and his breath stuttered as he imagined her here, in this shower with him. She was still in that lathy white dress, but under the shower, he could see the outline of her breasts and her nipples. He let off a growl, lifting her off her feet and pressing her against the shower wall.

So supple. So his. She wanted him, he could feel her lips pressing all along his neck. He could hear the ringing in his ears as he clenched his jaw, panting as he thrust home.

He gripped his cock in his hands tight, giving it some squeezes to mimic the pulsing feel of her that he knew would be there. Swearing against her hair, praising her with each move he made. He imagined gripping her creamy thighs, marking her neck and breasts as he did his best to ensure that any other lovers she'd ever had before would be erased from her memory.

He gasped as his orgasm hit, eyes opening to nobody else in the room, and the flood of disappointment sinking into his stomach as he decorated the shower wall.

He leaned his forehead against the glass shower door, and whimpered, "Angel…" on half a sob.

Why couldn't she be real?

* * *

He put a new pair of cotton pajama bottoms on, pulling on a white t-shirt without the slightest bit of patience or grace. Sitting down at his desk, he opened his briefcase, clicking on the lamp. A glance at the clock told him that it was almost 1am. It was pitch black outside, only the glistening of the moon on the cresting waves giving any sign of which way was up.

He stared at the blackened waves a bit too long, something about the pitch seemed to call out to him. He felt the pounding in his ears as his eyes followed the light on the water.

He could hear the chants from the cave. **Iyah… iyah…**

"Rassilon fhtagn…" he murmured, glassy-eyed, before his phone buzzed from a text message notification. Fuck, it was Clara. He clicked to open it.

{{_What the hell, Alec?! Jeanne Antoinette just left my room crying because you lead her on and then kicked her out? Call me. NOW.}}_

He raised an eyebrow at the sms, and typed back. She could talk a good game, but she knew better than to think he would listen to orders like that. Alec and Kate had taken after their dad, the retired Admiral Lethbridge-Stewart. Kate had gone right into the Royal Navy, and he could remember watching her ascend ranks with stars in his eyes when he was younger. While not going into the military, he'd become a policeman and gotten into a leadership position as soon as possible. The look on his father's face had been bursting with pride as he'd shaken his son's hand after he'd graduated from the police academy, and his older sister introducing him to her peers, and the way she'd looked at him… every brother should experience that level of love. They'd always gotten on like houses, and Clara had often felt the odd one out, despite their support of her.

Clara had taken after their mum, working as a teacher and having her nose in everyone else's business. She had youngest sibling syndrome something fierce, pushed away everyone who ever tried to help her, and always insisted that she knew what was best for positively everybody. Everyone knew better than to call her a control freak to her face, as the tantrum would be forthcoming, but it was thought often enough in her direction. They loved her so, but were glad when she started to relax a bit as she got older.

Hence insisting he came on this stupid yacht for the weekend. She'd pleaded with him over the phone, saying that she and Danny needed him there to spend time together, because she missed him. He'd allowed himself to get suckered into it, finding out once the ship left shore that it had been her trying to set him up with three of her friends from the school she worked at. She had hoped that he would like at least one of them.

Something about how he needed to move on, get over Tess, get back on the market. Now that he'd been redeemed, he had a lot to offer a good woman, and if he wanted to get custody of Daisy back, he needed a stable home life. She'd known he would be against the idea, but as he'd had no choice, he'd hoped it would just be three shy teachers who would bore him to death with discussion of their school subjects.

Instead, she'd managed to find three women who assumed they were already a shoe-in for a relationship with him. River Song was an Archaeology/History teacher, and subtlety was far from her strong suit. She kept calling him her future husband, and practically purring the word _sweetie_ at him. Jeanne Antoinette Poisson was a French teacher who thought that him telling her he wasn't interested was 'playing hard to get, lover'. Lynda Moss was an Administrative Secretary, and the least obnoxious of the three. She just stared at him with puppy eyes and kept trying to talk to him about some comic book she was reading, and telling him how he looked better than in the papers.

{{_You keep that little psycho the hell away from me. She came into my room uninvited all trussed up and I sent her on her way.}}_

He scowled, opening his files, not sure why he had been so entranced by the water. He began writing about his dream again, including the part about the shipwreck. That was new. He hadn't dreamt about that before at all, at least as far as he could remember. He found no mention, and rubbed at his eyes in exhaustion, both mental and physical. Sliding his glasses on, he continued writing, a bit of a faraway look in his eyes appearing as he remembered how his body burst to life when she touched his tattoo.

He was startled out of his reverie when his phone buzzed again. Oh yes, his sister.

{{_She's never been turned down before. It's a heartbreaking experience for a woman to put herself out there for a man, just to be turned down cold. You weren't attracted at all?}}_

He let out a laboured sigh, shaking his head.

He started to text, _'I wish you'd remember you're my sister, instead of only her friend'_ and then deleted it in a rush. She and their mum had likely cooked up the idea, and once she put her mind to something, she couldn't be stopped. _  
_  
He stared down at the blank screen, before typing '_Good night'_ and shutting his phone off. He didn't have the energy to deal with this right now.

Glancing down at the page, he could see right underneath the sketch he'd made of his angel (he did one every other page, it seemed) he had written entire paragraphs in those weird looking glyphs he sometimes drew. He'd made them up when he was a kid, because some of them looked similar to his tattoo. The script looked almost threatening, and he couldn't read what it said, never having assigned each one an actual letter.

"What the fuck is happening to me…" he muttered, rubbing his five o clock shadow before shutting his Journal of Impossible Things and hiding it back in the briefcase, locking it. It wouldn't do for anyone to see it and have him institutionalised. His stomach clenched as he acknowledged that they were the ravings of a man who had cracked. If he wanted to make the logical, sane decision, he would give each of those girls a solid chance. He would face the day tomorrow, and try to honestly communicate with them.

Maybe one of them would be worth dating. Maybe he could get a stable home, and bring his daughter back. Maybe he could have more children, and a life. Maybe he could be satisfied with that.

But he knew that wasn't going to happen. He had tried marriage, after accidentally getting Tess pregnant when they were teenagers. It had only served to show him that with one governmental document, he could go from making himself miserable, to making two people miserable. His daughter was his only shining light, and he wanted to apologise to her a thousandfold for her mother not being his angel. Instead she was a demonic harpy, that according to their last phone call, was making her equally miserable.

He should put all of this spooky shite away, just focus on surviving this weekend without committing homicide, and then getting back home and phoning a lawyer. He needed his daughter back home, where she belonged.

He went to sleep, pretending not to be hopeful that he would see his golden haired angel, rubbing his mark.


	2. Shipwrecked!

_He was filled with an utter dread that he could not explain. _

_Being called to a scene of a crime was nothing new for him, unlike it had been when he was a newbie on the force. It used to send a thrill down his arms, the thought that he would do actual policing, and that he would make his family of overachievers proud of his long line of work. He, as a probie, would try to step out of the car with some swagger to his step and head onto the scene like bloody Lethal Weapon or some bit. That was when he was a young sprog, and as the cases piled up, the bureaucracy and the heartbreak, and becoming the Worst Cop in Britain, he lost his groove along the way. _

_Now, each step felt more heavy than the last, the clamour around him sounding almost far away, as though he were in a cave. The sand gave way here and there, making even more of an effort needed to cut across to where his partner was on the scene. This was unusually heavy, because while a new scene was always weighted, this one he could feel in his stomach, in his chest. His heart skipped a beat and made him panic._

_Why were they here? He couldn't remember the call. Beth Latimer shot him a look of… sympathy? _

_She clutched her hand next to her heart, her other hand holding her wrist in a strangely protective stance, but she looked like she wanted to reach out to him. That had never happened before, she fucking hated him. She never really spared him a kind word or a soft glance, and he had never blamed her for feeling that way. It had pissed him off a few times, but not at her, never at a grieving mother. Only at himself, for not being able to use a fucking wand and give her her child back from the monster who killed him. She had every right to hate everyone to do with what happened to her son. _

_He would have, had it been Daisy._

_Coming back to himself a bit, he glanced around, uncertainly. Police lines holding people back, the siren lights spinning, the area taped off to keep the general public back so they could do their jobs. Familiar, familiar, familiar. Why did he feel so out of place? Was he in shock over something? Did he have a hangover? He walked past the logs, further onto the beach, hearing someone giving a statement to an officer._

_"I can't explain it, just came out of the waves like that. I don't know what she was doing there like that, but then… I don't know. She looked so weak. I reached to help her and she screeched at me like some kind of fuckin animal, and then fell over and just… died. I swear, I didn't do anything to her…"_

_A likely story, 'I swear, I didn't do anything' sure was. After so long of being a DI, he'd heard so many excuses, alibis, and lies but the main one was always swearing you did nothing wrong, as though a cop would then go 'Oh, boy, well, he swore it. Ain't did nothin wrong, him, fer surely.' and would close the bloody case._

_As he noticed more of the scene, it felt kind of like looking through the rainy windshield at night, finding new parts of the world. He noticed the cries of someone, somewhere… who was crying? It was a man, a man somewhere letting out wracking sobs. The girl's father? A brother, a husband, a lover? The wind picked up, and he felt the cold lines along his cheeks, making his hand tremble as he reached up to feel that it was him. _

_His jaw was trembling, making the stammered pushback of a wail. _

_Why was he crying?_

_Miller looked up from the crime scene as he approached, already tarped off to protect from the elements as he came closer. Her face was pulled dead serious as she approached him, hands up in a placating pushback manner, shaking her head no. "Don't do it… You don't want to see this..." _

_Don't want to see what? He noticed feet, pale white skin tinged with purple and blue post mortem markings, places where blood settled. It was the gauzy dress that made his stomach clench, and as he saw the wrist with the same mark as his, he heaved off to the side, painfully retching out whatever he had previously eaten._

_Nononono… Not his angel, no no no… Not her, not her… _

_He tried to move closer, and Miller tried to push him back. He shoved his way forward, ignoring the pain in his chest from that much exertion, looking down and seeing that beautiful face covered in blood and sand. He let out a howl he didn't realise he was capable of, falling forward into the sand and crawling on hands and knees to her body._

_"Angel? Angel?" He stroked her hair with a shaky hand. "Angel, please…" he whimpered, feeling for her pulse. He knew she was dead, but something drove him to it. He couldn't lose her. How could he survive without her somewhere within him? She was born for him, damn it, for him!_

_He started trying CPR, as though that would help at all. The first time he touched those lips in real life he wanted to be a loving, magical feeling. Instead, they were cold as ice, stiff… he was kissing a dead woman with the desperation to breathe life back into her limbs._

_He heard Miller pleading with him to stop, telling him she was dead, this was no use, he was causing more damage to the body. He could feel that the amount of pressure was cracking her ribs - as CPR could sometimes do, due to the chest compressions. About 30% of those who survived CPR woke up with a cracked sternum and/or broken rib. He listened to the cacophony for all of a moment before trying to pick her up._

_His angel shouldn't be in the middle of this… scene. These disgusting men, unclean humans who were not of Rassilon, trying to put their filthy meat mitts on her tender flesh. It was not to be considered. Not even good enough for tributes._

_Someone tried to grab him away, speaking to him, but instead, he reacted on an instinct he didn't realise he had, his mouth opening in a snarl as he said a sentence that looked like a bunch of the scary glyphs he wrote. He knew what it meant - it was a warning, a death threat for anyone touching his mate. _

_She was his, gifted to him! Created specifically for him, as he was for her, they had no right to tell him what to do with her! _

_He picked her up, walking past the coroner, past the CSIs who had been trying to gather evidence. The clamour faded to the background of his mind, everyone's movements on the periphery. He could feel the mist of the sea as he stood with her on the dock, hearing cries from people behind him like the buzzing of so many flies._

_"Alec! What are you doing?! Alec!"_

_"Hardy, what are you doing mate? Come on back!"_

_That sounded like his sister! Just as he turned to pay attention, he felt the weight of his angel in his arms, and he glanced back down at her._

_She was dead. He had nothing left to live for. The pain erupted into his chest, and he thought he could feel his heart finally give out when he felt a hand on his wrist._

_"Alec!"_

_Was that Danny?_

_He felt his Angel move, and glancing down at her, could see her, staring at him. _

_She lived?!_

_"Home…" she whispered, in a voice that made his heart pump blood again. He had waited so long to hear her speak, and now… it was the most precious gift. "Come home, Theta… come home to me…"_

_She fell into the water, as though he'd dropped her. He shouted after her, and tried to jump off the dock to chase her when someone strong grabbed him around his middle and yanked him back, painfully, onto the floor._

_"Home!" he shouted, trying to fight the person off him. "Home! Gallifrey! Home!" _

* * *

__

"Home!" Alec shouted, struggling on the deck of the boat against Danny, who was trying to hold him down. "Gallifrey! Home!"

"Alec, please!" Clara cried, on her hands and knees on the floor next to where her brother was, his cheek pressed hard against the wet wood of the deck. "Look at me, please! Open your eyes, open, open, open your eyes!"

Alec's mouth went slack, and he opened his eyes for the briefest of moments, seeing not his sister, but his angel.

"Come home…" she whispered, reaching out to touch his face. "To Gallifrey. Come to me…"

He used all of his strength to throw Danny off his back, trying to get to his angel, when he was suddenly slapped, hard, followed by a bunch of water thrown on him.

He sat there, dumbly, blinking away the water as he looked at his damp angel, seeing her morph in an instant into his sobbing sister.

"Clara?"

"Thank god!" she nigh on howled, throwing her arms around him and nearly crushing his windpipe as she clung to him in a way that she hadn't since they were kids.

"Clara… what the hell?"

"God, Alec, what's happening to you? Is this PTSD or something?"

"What?"

He was ushered inside, his sister still harping on his every step. His teeth were chattering, and the other people on the damn boat were staring at him with something odd in their eyes.

He didn't understand what happened.

"Where is she?" he grumbled, his trembling hands taking a cuppa from Lynda with a Y.

"She who? Alec, what are you talking about?"

"Angel. Where is she?"

"Who is Angel? Alec, are you high?!"

"She was here!" his blood pressure rose, as it often did, much higher than his doctor would have wanted.

"Alec, we're the only ones who are here. You've been dreaming. Sometimes, dreams feel really real. Who is Angel, Alec?"

Alec made a noise of disbelief. She got more and more real with every dream for the past two days, it was as if he was closer to her. But she wasn't real…. Right? Was he insane? He felt her. He knew her. He heard her.

"Clara, Sweetie, your sister Kate is on the phone," River murmured, looking up at Alec with her cat eyes.

The look she gave him was one of lust and it made his entire body uncomfortable.

"Thank God!" she cried, rushing off to speak on the phone with Kate while Danny took her place across from him.

"You okay?" he asked, softer than his counterpart, trying to put him at ease.

"I don't think I will be for a time, no."

"What happened, brother?"

"I… I don't know…"

His cop instincts were kicking in here. Clara's look at him, the way the three girls watched him uncertainly, Danny… he knew how to be an innocent witness. He knew how to play and what to say to turn this into his favour.

"You don't know? Alec, you tried to leap overboard!"

"Overboard? Why would I do that?!" he snapped, not liking the way his hairs on his arm were raising. He was fucking losing it.

"I don't know, we're trying to figure that out."

"I was having a nightmare, I guess… when I was a little boy, I used to sleepwalk during my nightmares…"

He heard his sister demand from their older one over the phone if that was true, and she looked at Danny and nodded after Kate's answer.

"I dreamt about a murder scene I saw recently… someone I knew was killed. I didn't handle it well…"

The scene flashed before his eyes, and he looked away, holding his hand over his heart much like Beth had done in his dream.

"Oh, Alec," Clara whispered. "Why didn't you tell me? I would have planned an entirely different weekend… Alec, I'm so sorry."

He didn't know how to respond, so he did what most innocent victims did and simply didn't, looking down. In all honesty, his mind was a tempest of thoughts and emotions. He had never done this before. He knew he was going crazy, but this was so extreme. How could he possibly get it under control? A therapist? But what if they made him truly realise that his angel wasn't real? How would he survive without her? He didn't want to.

Clara handed him the phone to speak to Kate for a few. Most of her words sluiced off of his body oddly - he always paid her rapt attention, but he just couldn't catch a word she said outside of 'post traumatic stress' and 'paid leave'. She was right, but he, much like all of his family, was in too deep with his job. He was beyond burnt out, but he wouldn't know how to handle civilian life and he knew that. He couldn't handle not working day in and day out, he wouldn't know how to function.

Clara took the phone away and marched off down the hall, feeling more confident in being the correct one, right to call, the one who finally got to be the responsible and mature one after a lifetime of being left behind.

To be honest, her core was shaken by seeing her immovable older brother, always so strong, have a moment of weakness. She stroked her lucky coin necklace while looking at him. She'd gotten it from her dad from a shipwreck he'd found at sea, and considered it her lucky mermaid's treasure ever since.

Her big brother hadn't even permitted himself a moment of weakness during the investigation and Tess' duplicity. He had held so strong she was sure nothing could get through his armour.

"We just care about you, is all," Danny placated, patting his leg from across from him in what was meant as comfort.

Alec always found him fuckin weird, but at least he cared.

Danny walked over to Clara when she sounded a bit more upset down the hall, sniping at Kate that she did _too _know how to handle this, her idea of a love boat was _not _stupid, and she _wasn't fifteen anymore you know _!

River took that opportunity to sidle up next to him laying her hand on his leg a bit too close for comfort. He shifted away with an irritated grunt.

"You know sweetie, nightmares aren't an uncommon thing. Sleepwalking comes directly from stress, you know. Or, in the cases of many children, can come from an interruption in the sleep cycle, almost like sleep paralysis. It can be hereditary… so can many things. Why, I bet your daddy had that sexy brow…"

He made a noise of disgust and stood up, walking across the room to the liquor cabinet behind the bar. Tea wasn't going to cover it.

Lynda with a Y smiled as she walked over to the bar near him. She sat on a stool and murmured, "Hey Barkeep. Got anything good back there?"

She wasn't flirting, she wasn't sending him scandalised looks. She was just being friendly, and he appreciated that as he was struggling to come to terms with his apparently quickly degrading sanity.

He poured her a scotch, which she tried and coughed, making a whiskey face. He smirked a bit, shaking his head. She was adorable, and the least annoying of the three. If he were to give anyone a chance, it would be this one.

"Bit strong for ye?" He teased, taking a strong gulp of his own.

"Not everyone's tough and Scottish you know," she pouted into her tumbler.

He poured himself another glass, feeling the alcohol calm his nerves a bit. His doctor was gonna fucking kill him.

"Do you have nightmares a lot?"

Alec shook his head. "Not necessarily. Usually just the same dream, over and over."

Why was he telling her this?

"For how long?" She tilted her head. Something about her honest, nonjudgmental interest prompted him to speak up.

"A few decades now."

She choked on her scotch. "Ow, oh my gosh that burns! Agh…."

"Got it up the nose, have ye?"

"Mhmn! Ouchie. Ahem. When I was a girl, I used to dream the same dream over and over, and I started dream journaling, you know?"

A flash in his mind of his Journal of Impossible Things made him nod.

"I started to notice that like, I was adding more and more detail to my dream. Each time, right?"

He scooted a bit closer to her, now paying rapt attention. She noticed their proximity and blushed, looking down at her drink to keep talking. He remembered the boat. That had been new.

"Well, my dream therapist-"

"That's a fucking job?!"

She flushed darker, and continued, as though he hadn't interrupted. "My dream therapist said that we repeat dreams because we aren't finished dreaming them. Maybe you just aren't dreaming it all the way through."

That was something to chew on, certainly.

* * *

Alec stood under the shower, grumbling about how washing too much was going to give him dry skin at this rate, but he needed to scrub the nightmare from his skin.

Standing under the warmth, he started washing his hair and trying to get a grip.

She wasn't dead, there was no need to get so hysterical. But it had felt so real, and if he lost her…

_A set of nails whispered across his torso. _

If he lost her… he would definitely want to throw himself overboard. He would force himself to live, of course, for Daisy… but he would always want to die. He would probably die of heartbreak.

_A soft kiss to his shoulder. Then another. _

No… he couldn't… not right now… he had almost thrown himself overboard, this was serious. This was getting out of control.

_Her soft body pressed against his back, a soft scratch to his bum cheek and then up his spine. _

His eyes rolled back into his head, and he breathed shallowly. "Angel…"

_She pulled him tighter, pressing him deeper into the front of her, stroking along his pecs and teasing tightly at his nipples with her nail. _

Fuck, she knew how he liked to be touched. Don't think, don't think.

_A teasing whisper of her fingers down along his abdomen, taking their time in soft traces of his flesh. _

"Angel…" he leaned his head back against her shoulder, giving his body openly to her in a way he never would another. Never had. Never could.

_She lightly ran her nails across his cock, which was at full attention by now. _

So ramrod straight he could have hung mariner's flags on it at this point, he thought ruefully.

_Taking him in hand, she rocked against his behind lightly so he could have a taste of her hips as she released a breath against his neck. She pressed her lips against the vein she found first in gentle kisses, then deciding to mark him as hers as she squeezed his cock firmly before giving him a few good, tight strokes. _

"Ah, fuck, Angel…"

_She was kissing his neck like she wanted to kiss him, and he turned his head to take her mouth. They kissed with a filthy, unbridled passion, much so that he couldn't help but wonder what it would be like to feel her mouth elsewhere. _

One day, he would park himself between her thighs and make her forget everything that she'd ever known. He would suck, kiss, and lick every bit of the honey from her centre until she had full blown amnesia. He would wake her every morning that way if he could.

_She began to pulsate her squeezes, changing it up as she did a turn around the head of him, making him babble softly. He didn't know what he was saying outside of soft praises that made no sense and her name. _

He came embarrassingly quickly at her hand, and as he turned to apologise, not even the ghost of her was there.

He was alone, and just the thought of this woman had made him fall apart like an untried high schooler.

He fought the urge to fall apart, instead rinsing off almost robotically.

* * *

Alec came out of his cabin after a shower, and for the most part, nobody was giving him a shifty eyed look like he was about to leap to his death anymore.

No one, except for Jeanne.

Not that the daft hen mattered anyhow.

Danny was fixing breakfast when he commented idly about how the sky had looked so clear before, but now it looked like it was going to storm like mad.

"Oh _joy _," sneered the French Teacher. "What a perfect weekend. Come on this weekend to my friend's yacht, Jeanne, meet my cute brother, Jeanne, he's got a good job and owns his own home in a coastal town. Did I tell you he was famous, Jeanne?!"

Alec's stomach clenched. Was that how his sister spoke of him? They needed to have words, preferably with Kate present. She could always steer Clara straight.

"You never told me he was _insane _but it all makes sense now! Trying to throw himself off the ship for any reason _other _than turning me down for sex!"

Clara tried to placate her friend, patting her on the back and reassuring her that she was still gorgeous and that any man would want to sleep with her, making her brother shoot her a look of disbelief.

"I know that I could! Any prick in the world I wanted, I could have a selection of them, all whipped out for me! Only me!"

Alec met Danny's eyes, and they both rolled their eyes.

"Maybe he didn't want to fuck you because he has actual taste," River said from her chair, filing her nails idly.

"I cannot believe how I have been insulted on this pathetic excuse for a yacht! I could have been with Louis all weekend, he is a millionaire you know! Well, after his father dies he will be. Instead, I am with a half-cocked cop. TURNING ME DOWN FOR SEX! Your brother is a LUNATIC, Clara!"

She stomped off down the hallway, shouting a bit more.

"Some men don't want a stupid French whore!" River shouted, making Jeanne whip round on her.

Alec pinched the bridge of his nose. "Oh for fuck's sake-"

"I'm not going to tell you what to do, but having sex with either one is ill-advised. Brother, do not stick your dick in crazy."

Alec nodded, lifting his tumbler in a small salute to that.

"I told Clara not to set this up, for what it's worth." Danny murmured.

River and Jeanne were shouting insults back and forth before they leapt on each other, throwing more scratches and pulling more hair than actually throwing fists.

"Guys can we please not fight-" Lynda tried, when the entire ship lurched, feeling as though it hit something.

Something big.

This stopped everyone due to the sudden shaking of the ship before it stopped.

River and Jeanne slowly sat up, the power flickering a bit.

"What did we hit?" Clara asked, just as the boat started to move all on its own, as though something was pulling it, violently.

"What the fuck?!" shouted River, stumbling along with the rest of them.

It was as if the entire ship was in the middle of an earthquake. Alec held onto the side of the bar, Lynda gripping the nearest table. It stopped a few moments later, and everything seemed eerily calm and silent, everyone afraid to speak. The only sound filling the room was the heavy, frightened breathing from each individual.

The ship began to listlessly float along the water, and he looked up at his sister as she felt the same thing. There was no way to be their father's child and not know when a boat was going out of control. She and he raced to the bridge, her throwing open the door and turning the keys in the ignition. The clicking noise was not a good sign, and that was when he noticed that the silence was due to the lack of hum of the engines. He caught her eyes and could tell that she was on the same page.

"Shit, just, shit!" Clara hissed, running back down the hall with him on her tail just as the boat got hit again, sending her and Alec into the wall, and others into less graceful positions.

"What's happening?" Danny asked, in a much calmer tone than the situation merited.

"We have no engines!"

"What, like they're gone?!"

"Dead, or, maybe dislodged by whatever we hit. We have to steer this boat the old fashioned way, and I don't think we can in this storm."

Alec nodded, looking outside and seeing the rain.

"The ring around those clouds, combined with the sideways rain can only mean one thing, Clara."

"Lightning storm, choppy seas, stay out of the water." She repeated what their father had said so many times.

"Why don't we get into the lifeboats and just make a break for it?!" River demanded.

"Oh, we absolutely could, if you wanted us all to die." Alec snapped.

"They're called life boats for a _reason _. To save your _life _." River returned, crossing her arms over her chest. She didn't seem to realise she was preaching to two people who knew boats better than she.

"Right now we are in uncharted waters in the middle of a storm, after crashing our ship. The local sharks around these parts know the sound of a boat crash. They can smell blood from 3 miles away. Sharks have ampullae of Lorenzini, sensory organs that allow them to sense the electric current of the heartbeats of their prey within a radius of 328 ft." He walked closer to her until he was right in front of her, sending her a hardened look.

Alec looked around, everyone was paying attention except Clara, who knew this by heart. Their father had schooled them well on the sea.

"In most cases, sharks are the least of your concern in the water, especially in a lifeboat. In most cases, they don't care. Food, water, communication with whoever's going to save you - not to mention the health and safety of people on the raft - would all be of greater concern than a shark attack. But sharks in areas with lots of boat wrecks are known to think of the sound of the wreck vibrating through the water as a dinner bell. They're scavengers, and while most sharks won't eat humans, some'll still try. In stormy weather with choppy seas, their already poor vision becomes even poorer, and they're likely to become agitated."

Clara nodded, looking at her friends. "My brother is right. Going out in life rafts doesn't make sense when the ship is currently just fine, only has an engine problem that we can look at after the storm is over. But we can't see one way or the other, we don't know where land even is. We have all of our supplies on this boat, we would put ourselves into harm's way for no reason going out there without an idea of where to go with a lightning storm, in the water. Even if it wasn't madness to do, we could be days away from a shore with any supplies or even fresh water in a lifeboat. Here, we have everything to hole up for a few days more. If the sharks don't get you, dehydration will."

"What kind of sharks near England even attack humans?!" Jeanne scoffed.

"Shortfin Makos," the siblings said at the same time.

"They swim up to 60mph, and are known to be highly aggressive. The problem is that we're in mixed waters. We're somewhere not too far off the Orkneys and the Shetlands by my estimation, but without power in the yacht, our navigation system is down and I'm just guessing off the maps at this point. In marine accidents, the confusion leads sharks to feeding or antagonistic behaviours, where they will often bite anything repeatedly, including humans and animals. If we're in open water, they might be hungry and desperate. If we wait a few hours, we can check the propeller situation when its not storming, and is light out."

Alec nodded firmly. "Going out in the water in the middle of a storm in the dark is a fool's errand unless absolutely fucking necessary."

"Let's all just retire to our cabins. We've all had an excitable morning, we all could use more rest. Alec and I will check on the engines, see if anything can be done. Alec, want to join me in the ER?"

He nodded, getting up to walk with her toward the stern, grabbing the emergency torch from its spot on the wall on his way through.

Everyone murmured some agreement, and started to walk toward their cabins, ignoring the discomfort over the reality of the situation.

A loud groaning noise was heard outside, as though metal was being separated. A thudding noise hit the ship once, then twice, the vibration and bobbing coming through as if something had just landed on or slapped the yacht. Something very big. Chaos descended as the boat started to tip, being yanked downwards on the stern. There were loud screams, but the DI's mind was only on one thing. Alec ran toward his sister, trying to dodge as things fell off the wall.

A bookcase from the study in the stem of the ship slid down the hall at an alarming pace, the loud screech like nails on a chalkboard as it sailed down the hall, quickly followed by chairs. Why were they not nailed down?! Such a stupid thought to have while struggling against whatever this was.

He shouted Clara's name as she had almost made it to the Engine Room while he was grabbing their light, and she turned to look at him with wide eyes, grabbing for a door handle to hold onto as it became apparent that the ship was going vertical. He dodged the bookcase, but was not in time to miss the chair that sent him pitching downwards, hitting the bar table with a loud gasp of breath.

The bookcase missed Danny, but someone screamed. He couldn't tell who it was, but prayed it wasn't his sister as he was a bit out of it from the hit. As he started to get up, the sounds of multiple things falling and breaking as the shelves all over the ship were relieved of their wares just added to the terror in the atmosphere. As Alec glanced to the side, he could see the air positively glittering with broken glass.

River was struggling to hold onto the side of the railing, but she ended up falling, hard, and landing a good ten feet back against the wall, landing on some books and a vase that shattered under the force of it. She couldn't feel the pain, as she blacked out. Danny was struggling to hold the bookcase and the railing to keep it from hitting Clara, who was holding onto a doorknob with everything she had. She moved to adjust, and it was enough to turn the door handle and fling her outward.

She let out a cry, kicking in the air, and then gave up the ghost with the metal in her hand, dropping down the long hallway and cracking into the Engine Room door, which was partially open for some reason, making her run into and lie against one of the metal pipes. She grunted, feeling the beginnings of a goose egg against the back of her head, struggling to keep her eyes open.

"Clara, shut the door!" Alec shouted, trying to move enough forward to help Danny with the bookcase. "The fuck is this made of?"

"It's an antique of some sort," Danny said, shaking his head.

"They use the whole bloody tree, didn't they then?!" Alec grunted, trying to get a good grip. "Clara we can't hold it! You have to move out of the way!"

"I can't! I'm pinned!"

Jeanne was sobbing, trying to hold onto the lounge chair that actually seemed to be bolted down, like a smart person would do. "I'm going to die, we are going to die, squashed, we are going to be squashed!"

"Clara, listen to me, okay? I'm coming down to get you. Just keep talking to me, all right?"

"Okay," she said, in a weaker voice than Alec would have liked.

"What about the bookcase?!"

"Im helping with it, Clara!" Lynda said, trying to hold it from the other side.

"They've got it, Lynda has a good grip. The side of it she has has a mover's pull on it, so she's fine, all right? Just keep talking to me as I make my way down. Where are you caught?"

"My leg, it's wedged between the door and the piping."

"It's okay, I'm almost there." He used his feet on the doorframe, using it as a boost when he started swaying. It felt like the boat was being turned.

What the hell was causing this? A whirlpool of some sort? No fucking way. He couldn't think on it too long, too busy trying to get to Clara and not fall into the shower stall. He clung to the doorframe with fingers white from grip, hearing Clara making a noise of struggle as well. The front room was filled with similar - people looking to hold on.

"What the _fuck is that _?" someone asked, but Alec couldn't ask as his breath was stolen from him.

His heart felt like it was beating at a million miles a minute, and he couldn't catch his breath.

"Not now, damn it, not _now _!" he growled, but he could see stars and spotting before his vision. It was only a matter of time before-

He dropped like a sack, just as the boat readjusted.

The boat was suddenly released from whatever it was with a jerk, everyone shouting as it hit the water, sending a jolt and vibration through the floor. The boat dipped low, with the displacement of the water from the force, and then bounced back up, sending everything bursting forward in an instant.

Jeanne screamed bloody murder. River had just come to in time to hit the floor hard enough to go out again. Clara shrieked for her brother as she fell forward, dislodging her leg from where it was wedged painfully, skinning her shins on the sandy floor. It was Danny's shout that held the most merit, as he'd lost control of the bookcase as the floor of the boat caved in due to some rocks that had been hit with the new trajectory. Poor Lynda didn't make it out in time, ending up wedged firmly between a sharp bit of wood from the boat, the bookcase, and the rocks. Her feet drifted listlessly in the water, completely unconscious.

A small line of blood ran from her side and down her leg, into the water.

Something noticed.


End file.
